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Frescoed lunette of the Boston Massacre. British troops on the right in red uniforms and black hats, pointing bayonets. American colonists on the left in a variety of clothing and seemingly without weapons. Some men are fallen on the left. A man at the centre, bear-headed and in simple clothing, is raising a wooden staff and has caught hold of an opponent's bayonet. White municipal buildings tower over the scene in the background and to either side. The arch of the lunette is decorated in elaborate gold carving and gold, red and blue motifs.

From Amboyna to Boston: How Massacres Become Media Events

Massacres and their staging in the media impact our everyday lives more than we realize. Whether it’s the latest news about the horrors unfolding in the Middle East or shocking images from Ukraine, the media coverage of these events is brought directly into our living rooms. This information penetrates deep into the collective memory of societies, as these incidents are not just local tragedies, but raise questions about humanity, responsibility, and international reactions.

Acts of violence are documented and interpreted selectively, which means that the media take certain events and mould and shape them into ‘massacres’ in the first place.1 Here, what takes centre stage is often the question of guilt, as well as whether the event can generally be classified as a massacre. The term ‘massacre’ evokes affective reactions such as fear and unease and implies a threat of brutal violence against defenceless victims. The media construction of events as massacres thus serves as an effective means of indoctrinating social groups. The term itself is derived from the French massacre, which comes from the Old French for ‘butcher’s bench/slaughterhouse’. During the French Wars of Religion at the end of the sixteenth century,2 it became associated with collective violence against defenceless victims, taking on a meaning that survives until today. This definition was shaped in particular by the so-called St Bartholomew’s Night (1572), which, due to the considerable number of victims and unbridled cruelty, became firmly anchored in a European culture of remembrance. The media staging of acts of violence as ‘massacres’ suggests the construction of cruelty and injustice is more relevant than the number of victims. An analysis of these media constructions must also look at non-European ‘massacres’, whose reception histories, despite their longevity, have often been forgotten.

From Execution to Massacre: The Media Staging of the ‘Amboyna Massacre’ and its Use in Propaganda

The so-called ‘Amboyna Massacre’ took place in February 1623 on what is now Ambon Island (Moluccas, Indonesia), and involved the execution of ten members of the English East India Company and their nine Japanese mercenaries. The Dutch, who ruled the island at the time, had tried the men for insurrection—legally, in their view. A pamphlet that sought to legitimize the actions of the Dutch then triggered a reciprocal flurry of pamphlets, with the English side republishing theirs for decades. The publications focused on the method of torture applied, as well as its legality. The trading company’s members were bound, cloths wrapped around their heads, and then water was poured over them to induce a feeling of suffocation.3 The English media featured an image of this on the first page of their pamphlets, thus establishing a recurring pictorial motif of the cruelly tortured English martyr.

2 images of black and white figures in a bare-walled, tiled chamber with windows, either being tortured, inflicting torture or watching the proceedings. In the first, a gagged, bare-chested man is hanging by his wrists, from a scaffold and tied by his ankles to 2 stools. One well-dressed man pours water from a jug over his head, while another prods him with a, presumably sharp, implement. Another prisoner stands with is hands bound while the spectators point at him and talk amongst themselves A large bowl of water stands alongside the prisoner's clothes in the foreground. In the second, one prisoner kneels to be whipped by a guard, two guards wrestle with another prisoner on the ground, three other prisoners lie or languish on the ground, and a guard stands, looking on, in an open doorway, holding a staff.
Fig. 1: Copper engravings with captions: ‘The Torments inflicted by the Dutch on the English in Amboyna’ and ‘The Condition of the English in the Dungeon, and their Execution.’ 1744. Public domain.

This controversial event was seen as crucially important, triggering a diplomatic crisis between the European allies that led to three wars in the seventeenth century. Its significance was heightened by the fact that the English styled the trial in Amboyna as a massacre, making this the first time an event of this kind was described as a massacre in England. The unforgivable betrayal from the English point of view and the ensuing indignation formed the basis for the English understanding of the incident. ‘Amboyna’ became a key concept, charged with emotion, in defining the enduring and essential characteristics of subsequent British massacres.4 The episode was re-interpreted: a legally conducted trial became the unlawful ‘Amboyna Massacre’, a label that is still associated with the event today.5

The ‘Black Hole of Calcutta’: Media Staging and Emotional Charge in British Discourse

The so-called ‘Black Hole of Calcutta’ refers to an incident that took place on 20 June 1756 in the Indian city of Calcutta. After the fall of the English citadel Fort William, the troops of the Bengali Nawab Siraj-ud-Daulaha allegedly locked 146 British prisoners in a small, windowless room that became known as the ‘Black Hole’. Due to the extreme heat and cramped conditions, most of the prisoners died of asphyxiation or dehydration within a few hours. Mark Twain reported on the massacre in his travelogue,6 but the nature of the sources here is somewhat more complex. There is a large number of health books and travelogues on the subject, but various researchers have repeatedly expressed doubt about these accounts,7 suggesting that the retelling of the event actually borders on myth-making, particularly due to the literary, emotional style of the main account—the report by John Holwell.8 Holwell survived the massacre and described it eloquently:9

We had been but a few minutes confined before everyone fell into a perspiration so profuse, you can form no idea of it. This consequently brought on a raging thirst, which still increased, in proportion as the body was drained of its moisture…every man’s thirst grew intolerable, and respiration difficult…Now everybody, except those situated in and near the windows, began to grow outrageous, and many delirious: Water, Water, became the general cry . . . at last I became so pressed and wedged up, I was deprived of all motion.

It is therefore not surprising that several authors investigated the veracity of Holwell’s description of the ‘Black Hole of Calcutta’,10 resulting in controversy and debate about the exact circumstances and the number of fatalities.11 With its detailed description of the unhygienic, cramped, and damp conditions, the prisoners’ suffocation and dehydration, and the cruelty of the locals, the account fuelled European anxieties about the region and its people. It also referred to non-British prisoners (People of Colour, Portuguese) being locked up with the British, suggesting that the absence of racial (and possibly gender) segregation was seen as additional humiliation and degradation in the hierarchical racist ideology of the time. A manuscript from the Warren Hastings estate confirms that British subjects were imprisoned in the ‘Black Hole’, thereby reinforcing Holwell’s account. The Nawab’s subsequent order to expel all Europeans from the city is also mentioned.12

During my stay in London, I analysed some very interesting primary sources on the Black Hole and gained insight into the contemporary reception and handling of this incident. I spent most of my time in the British Library, examining petitions, compensation payments, and journal articles, as well as reports by the later governor, Warren Hastings. My aim in investigating these primary sources was to understand the mechanisms of public perception, the construction of narratives, and the instrumentalization of the event in the context of British colonial history.

We see the external wall of the dungeon with a studded wooden door and heavy iron locks. At the small window, we can just about see hands and faces pressed up against the window bars. In front of the building, a bare-chested local man wearing a turban and with a weapon attached to his belt stands pouring water from a receptacle into the bowl of another local, who is kneeling on the ground, looking up to the window.  Three other heads (two with turbans) are visible in profile on the right. The figures appear to be taunting or shouting at the prisoners. Some torches and flames are also visible.
Fig. 2: A print portraying the Black Hole of Calcutta. From Walter Hutchinson (ed.), Hutchinson’s Story of the Nations (London, 1913), 192. Public domain.

 ‘Blood was Flowing through the Streets’: The Journalistic Staging of the ‘Boston Massacre’

The Boston Massacre can be seen as a prototype for the successful staging of a massacre, which is why it will serve as the temporal endpoint of my investigation. The Boston Massacre took place on 5 March 1770, when British soldiers fired on an angry crowd in Boston, killing five civilians. It is one of the best-known massacres in history and is often associated with the American struggle for independence. It is also one of the most extensively researched American massacres in historical studies.

The atmosphere in the city was extremely strained. The colonists’ dissatisfaction with taxes, triggered by the Townshend Acts (1767) and the resulting stationing of 2,000 British soldiers in Boston (which had a population of 15,000), led to a highly tense situation, further exacerbated by economic competition. In the winter of 1769/70, the conflict between the British troops stationed in Boston and the local population escalated. The increasing tension manifested itself in daily clashes ranging from verbal provocations to physical confrontations. The massacre itself was triggered by an argument between an apprentice wigmaker and a British officer which led to a violent confrontation and the intervention of local citizens. The subsequent call for reinforcements from the 29th Regiment led to further escalation, as a result of which a soldier opened fire on the crowd. This incident, in which five civilians were killed and six others injured, marked a significant turning point in relations between the British colonial power and the citizens of Boston. It became known as the Boston Massacre, and quickly became a focal point for anti-British sentiment in the province. The indignation of the population was further intensified by targeted colonial propaganda.13 Before the end of March, Paul Revere, a committed patriot, published his engraving The Bloody Massacre perpetrated in King Street Boston.14 This copperplate was based on an original drawing by Henry Pelham, but Revere completed his engraving in a very short time, thereby pipping Pelham’s work to the post by a matter of days.15

A row of British soldiers on the right, wearing red uniforms and black hats, facing a row of American colonists, wearing blue uniforms and black hats, on the left. The British are firing their bayonets at the Americans, producing clouds of smoke. Some bodies lie on the ground in pools of red blood. Some figures are falling backwards, having been hit. A small dog is wandering around between the two groups. Boston municipal buildings in the background and lining the street in black and white.
Fig. 3: Boston Massacre engraving by Paul Revere, hand-coloured engraving, 29.2 x 24.2 cm. Boston, 1770  Public domain.

News of the Boston Massacre spread quickly and fuelled anti-British sentiment in the colonies. Propagandistic depictions by patriots, such as Paul Revere’s engraving, stylized the incident as a massacre of peaceful citizens by brutal soldiers,16 while loyalist counter-narratives emphasized the provocation by the crowd.17 These diverging narratives illustrate the media construction of massacres and their far-reaching impact.

My analysis shows that the media staging of massacres is a powerful instrument in constructing historical narratives and influencing public awareness. The examples I present show that the number of victims plays a secondary role. Instead, the focus is on emphasizing cruel and unlawful actions. The handling of massacres in British colonial history is a multi-layered and complex topic that illuminates the role of the British as both victims and perpetrators. The examples cited here offer an insight into the dynamics of violence, propaganda, and the instrumentalization of massacres for political purposes.


Feature Image: Painting of the Boston Massacre by Constantino Brumidi. Fresco, 1871, in the US Capitol building, room S-128. Photo credit: Architect of the Capitol.

Translated by Marielle Sutherland (GHIL).

  1. I am using ‘media’ here as a collective term that encompasses various types of media (paintings, pamphlets, poems, newspapers, etc.) from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. These vary in terms of their use, distribution, and target audience, but all aim to provide information and/or express opinions regarding the massacre. []
  2. See Peter Burschel, ‘Massaker’, in Friedrich Jaeger (ed.), Enzyklopädie der Neuzeit (Stuttgart and Weimar, 2008), vol. viii, Manufaktur – Naturgeschichte, 110–11; Cornel Zwierlein, ‘Die Genese eines europäischen Erinnerungsortes: Die Bartholomäusnacht im Geschichtsgebrauch des konfessionellen Zeitalters und der Aufklärung’, in Frank Bezner and Kirsten Mahlke (eds.), Zwischen Wissen und Politik: Archäologie und Genealogie frühneuzeitlicher Vergangenheitskonstruktion (Heidelberg, 2011), 91–129, at 91. []
  3. For more detail on this, see Alison Games, Inventing the English Massacre: Amboyna in History and Memory (New York, 2020), 3; Adam Clulow, Amboina, 1623: Conspiracy and Fear on the Edge of Empire (New York, 2019). []
  4. See Games, Inventing, 3. []
  5. See Clulow, Amboina, 3. []
  6. See Mark Twain, A Tramp Abroad, Following the Equator, Other Travels (Hartford, CT, 1880), ch. 54. []
  7. See Jan Dalley, The Black Hole: Money, Myths and Empire (London, 2006); Iris Macfarlane, The Black Hole or The Makings of a Legend (London, 1975); Birjen J. Guptas, ‘The Black Hole Incident’, The Journal of Asian Studies, 19/1 (1959), 53–63. []
  8. See John Zephaniah Holwell, A Genuine Narrative of the Deplorable Deaths of the English Gentlemen, and Others, who were Suffocated in the Black-Hole in Fort-William, at Calcutta, in the Kingdom of Bengal, in the Night Succeeding the 20th Day of June, 1756. In a Letter to a Friend (London, 1758). []
  9. Holwell, A Genuine Narrative, 260–1. []
  10. See Dalley, The Black Hole; Macfarlane, Makings of a Legend; George W. Hartmann, ‘The “Black Hole” of Calcutta: Fact or Fiction?’, The Journal of Social Psychology, 27/1 (1948), 17–35. []
  11. See Guptas, ‘The Black Hole Incident’, 76. []
  12. Corresp and Paper, MSS ADD 29209, British Library, Manuscript Collection (London), 17. []
  13. See Jeremy Black, Crisis of Empire: Britain and America in the Eighteenth Century (London and New York, 2008); Robert Blair St. George, Possible Pasts: Becoming Colonial in Early America (New York, 2000); Farah Peterson, ‘Black Lives and the Boston Massacre’, American Scholar, 88/1 (2019), 34–43; Karsten Fitz, ‘Commemorating Crispus Attucks: Visual Memory and the Representations of the Boston Massacre, 1770–1857’, Amerikastudien/American Studies, 50/3 (2005), 463–84; Andrea McArdle, ‘Race and the American Originary Moment: The Boston Massacre Narratives and the Idea of Citizenship’, Rutgers Race & the Law Review, 7 (2005), 51–106. []
  14. Paul Revere, The Bloody Massacre perpetrated in King Street Boston on March 5th 1770 by a party of the 29th Regt., engraved and sold by Paul Revere (Boston, 1770), Massachusetts Historical Society. []
  15. Henry Pelham, ‘The Fruits of Arbitrary Power, Or the Bloody Massacre, perpetrated in King Street Boston on March 5th 1770’, engraved and sold by Henry Pelham (Boston, 1770), American Antiquarian Society. []
  16. See John Bowdoin, Samuel Pemberton, and Joseph Warren, A Short Narrative of the Horrid Massacre in Boston (London, 1770). []
  17. See B. White, A Fair Account of the Late Unhappy Disturbance at Boston in New England (Boston, 1770). []

OpenEdition suggests that you cite this post as follows:
Michèle Kraft (September 12, 2025). From Amboyna to Boston: How Massacres Become Media Events. German Historical Institute London Blog. Retrieved November 7, 2025 from https://doi.org/10.58079/14ngo


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Michèle Kraft

Michèle Kraft studied history and art history at the Philipps-Universität Marburg. As part of her dissertation, she is researching the connection between violence and the media in so-called ‘massacres’ in the global context of the early modern period. She also works at the Herder Institute for Historical Research on East Central Europe.

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